


Peace

by Miri1984



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Drabble Fic, Friendship/Love, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-23
Updated: 2015-07-08
Packaged: 2018-04-05 19:04:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4191411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the events of New Dawn, Kanan needs to find his way to a new identity. Drabbles set before Star Wars Rebels, post A New Dawn. Mostly Kanan/Hera centric, with some side characters as more info becomes available. HOPEFULLY canon compliant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He wasn’t entirely sure when the decision to start meditating again happened.

Some point between stopping a massive pile of metal and wire from crushing him and Hera on Cynda and knowing… _really knowing_ that Skelly had died, perhaps. 

Maybe the idea had been forming in his head the first time he heard her voice.

 

He loved the ship. Loved it. When he’d been Caleb -- when he’d been an apprentice -- a ship had been something to take him places. He’d wanted to see the galaxy, wanted to know what it was to fight, and the ship he’d been traveling in had been secondary to that. You didn’t worry about the vessel when all you cared about was the destination.

It’d been different, after. Ships had been more important, because when he was traveling, when he was going from one thing to another, he could find a kind of peace. He didn’t have to be Caleb or Kanan. He didn’t have to know anyone, or pretend that he knew them. He could relax into the knowledge that he was _between_ \-- that there was one place to start, and then another place... to start again.

The Ghost was different. Hera was different. It was terrifying and comforting at the same time, like everything he’d known was ripped away from him, but _not_ like it had been on Kellar. This wasn’t darkness, fire and pain. He’d been rudderless before, and he always found a way, steering through with skill and luck and a hefty dose of charm. Hera though. Hera and the Ghost? They felt like he imagined home must feel.

 

Something precious. Something that could be lost.

 

So he meditated because otherwise he would be too afraid to move.

 

Hera had given him his own quarters. He put the holocron and the lightsaber in the safest place he could find, paranoid that she would somehow know they existed. That he could use the force… no… that the force was _with_ him… was different to being a jedi. He wasn’t a jedi. He wasn’t a general like Obi-Wan and his Master had been. He could follow one, though.

 

He could follow Hera.

 

His quarters were quiet enough for meditation, if the droid didn’t know he was there. It was strange, the first time he tried, kneeling in a position that felt wrong, because the last time he’d sat this way his knees had been knobbly and his legs thin -- his shoes had dug into the bones of his backside and he’d felt all the gangliness and awkwardness of fourteen years and not old enough to be fighting a war that would never end and the idea of finding peace within himself, within a body and a mind that jumbled and tumbled with too many teachings and too many hopes and too many dreams and fantasies that he could laugh at now to remember…

Well. Peace wasn’t a lie, but to a fourteen year old padawan it was a story told by older and wiser men than he ever thought he could be.

Now his knees folded with a slight creak (surely he wasn’t that old) and he remembered to remove his shoes before kneeling. He was still flexible enough that the position wasn’t uncomfortable -- at least -- not at first.

After a few minutes he had newfound respect for his teenage self. Discipline and focus. The two things he’d always thought he’d lacked.

They took practice.

As an apprentice, meditation had been a chore. He’d never really understood why so many masters (and full jedi) turned to it at the drop of a hat. Something went wrong, they meditated, something went right, they meditated.

He and a few of the other younglings had come to the conclusion that they did it to irritate padawans, that it was some sort of elaborate hoax to drive padawans into greater focus on their training.

He’d never felt the need to do it himself until after Kaller, and he’d never reached the kind of calm serenity he knew Master Depa Billaba had seemed to pull around herself like a cloak whenever she emerged from the trance.

He took a deep breath, and closed his eyes.

 _There is no fear,_ he told himself. _There is only the force._

Yeah, right.

 

“Kanan,” her voice never failed to surprise him.

He blinked, looking up into the doorway. Hera stood there, her sillouhette hazy with the brightness of the light behind her in the corridor, head tilted so her lekku were tumbling to her right.

He scrambled to his feet. “Yeah?”

“I’ve been calling you on comm,” she said. “We’re about to come out of hyperspace.”

He blinked. That was impossible, he’d only sat down to meditate a…

“How…?” he said looking around.

“I figured you were tired,” she said. “So I’d let you sleep. It was pretty rough back there…” Hera wasn’t stupid. “But you weren’t sleeping. Were you.”

It wasn’t a question.

“I ah…” Kanan swallowed, pressed his lips together. He didn’t want to embarrass himself. Or do what his heart was telling him to do, and spill out his entire life story.

She had one piece of him, a piece he’d been willing to give. If he gave her everything else, he’d be helpless.

His eyes adjusted to the light around her enough that he could make out a small smile playing on her lips. “It’s okay,” she said, in that gentle way she had. “I just wanted to make sure you were ready for landing.”

“I’m.. I am ah. I’m ready.” He tried for a charming smile. Didn’t quite hit it, but it was close. “Where are we?”

“Little world they call Lothal,” Hera said, turning her back. “I know some people here that can help.”

He took in a breath that surprised him for its length, for the lack of tension in his shoulders as it moved out of his body, for the peace that made his limbs heavy and light at the same time.

“Lead the way,” he said, and his voice was different as well. Kanan Jarrus was different. 

_I’ll follow._


	2. A little hope.

_Pre-Rebels, just post A New Dawn._

Hera unlocked the door of the cockpit automatically when she’d finished her transmission to Fulcrum and sunk her head on her chest. She should set coordinates for Lothal -- there were supplies to pick up, a new contact (Devaronian, Fulcrum had said) to meet. Things to arrange. But her mind was too busy with possibilities.

She’d only met Fulcrum a few times since joining the rebellion. The last had been just before the mission to Gorse. Everyone knew she was a Jedi, although she never referred to herself as such. She carried lightsabers. Hera had no doubt she could use them.

Kanan Jarrus was so different to Fulcrum that Hera hadn’t even begun to suspect his secret when he’d given it away. Perhaps all Jedi were that different to each other, but something told her that his behaviour hadn’t been dictated by the Jedi code, not in the way that Fulcrum’s seemed to be. He didn’t feel like a Jedi.

But he needed to know that he wasn’t alone.

She made a decision, and headed towards his quarters.

“I thought we were meant to make a jump,” Kanan said, when she got there. She lead him out into the common area.

“Yeah. Well. We are. But there was something I wanted to tell you first. Or ask you. Or both, I suppose.”

They sat at the bench, Hera putting her gloved hands in front of her. She couldn’t tell him everything. That was absolutely against policy. But she didn’t see why she couldn’t at least give him a little…

...hope.

“You know I work for someone…” she began, but stopped when he put one hand over hers.

“Look… Hera. I don’t need to know anything about the people you’re doing this for. I don’t want to know anything about them, if you’re trying to break it easy to me that you can’t let me in on every decision you make I don’t…”

“No. No it’s not that.” She sighed. “It’s about.. what you are.” He pulled his hand back from her, eyebrows raising, suspicion flaring. Her heart ached that he might think she was going to betray him and she shook her head, trying to make him understand. “I just… think you should know. That I don’t think you’re alone.”

“You don’t think I’m alone,” he said, flatly. “What, right now? In general? Or…?”

“I don’t think you’re the only Jedi left,” she said. Saying the word was difficult for some reason, and she had to resist the urge to look around to see if someone was listening. Foolish, when she and Kanan were the only ones here.

He frowned. “Uh huh,” he said. “Aaannd what makes you think that, Captain? Don’t tell me I wasn’t the first force user to selflessly give himself away saving your life. That,” he tried for a smile, but there was something else in that expression, “would hurt.”

She opened her mouth. Fulcrum was only a few years older than Kanan. It was possible that they knew each other. Possible that they’d trained together, had a shared history. Possible that they had more in common with each other than either of them could ever have with her.

Perhaps if they met, they could help each other heal.

But Fulcrum needed to be the one to reveal herself to Kanan, if she wanted to. She’d left it in her hands by telling her what Kanan was. Even that small betrayal sat like lead in Hera’s stomach, even though she knew that Fulcrum would as soon betray her new friend as the rebellion itself.

“My friends… my colleagues…” Hera said. “They’ve heard rumours.”

“We’ve all heard rumours,” Kanan said, standing up and turning away from her, and this time he didn’t bother to hide the bitterness from his voice. “They’re never true. Best to close your ears to them or they give you hope.”

“Have you truly given up hope, Kanan?”

He looked down but didn’t turn back to face her. “I was fourteen when the Jedi order died, Hera,” he said. “It’s not coming back. No matter how much some of us might want it to.”

She moved forward, put a hand on his arm. He looked at it, still frowning but didn’t turn back to her. “Do you want it to?”

“I…” he stopped, his lip curled and he shut his eyes, shaking his head. “It doesn’t matter what I want,” he said. “I’m here to help you now. Isn’t that enough?” His other hand twitched, curling as though it wanted to grip something, but he was still other than that. She felt like the moment itself was fragile, that if she said anything she might break him or break whatever it was that they had between them. Mutual trust. Admiration. Something else.

“I just wanted you to know,” she said finally. “I thought it might help.”

He slumped, sighing. “I appreciate it,” he said. “But you don’t have to worry about me -- about that. I left it all behind a long time ago.” He patted the hand on his arm, awkwardly, given their angle, then gently removed it, walking back towards his quarters.

“I’m sorry, Kanan,” she said too softly for him to hear. “I wish I could give you more.”


	3. Things we say after we kiss...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tumblr prompt.

****

_We’re not supposed to do this._

He can still feel the dampness from her lips on his, her breath is warm against his skin, the rocky wall of the cave presses into her back. He needs to step away, step back, he can tell himself that they need the warmth, understand that they both need the comfort, he can put this into a box and mark it never open again never touch, never think about it, close it off put it  _away._

 _We’re not supposed to do this._ She tilts her head up again, a small invitation that he doesn’t hesitate to take, dipping down and pressing himself to her, one hand smoothing up her back, the other resting on the wall beside her, until he feels her hand on his arm, sliding up, fitting into his own hand, interlocking fingers as they kiss, slow, long,  _calm._

_There is no passion._

_“Kanan,”_ she says. 

 _We’re not supposed to do this._ The words are there, in his mouth, he can taste their shape as clearly as he can taste her skin. He should say them. He should… 

“It’s allowed,” he says, deep and soft, next to her mouth, before she kisses him again. He isn’t sure if he is talking to her, or to himself.

_They’re not supposed to do this, but who is left to tell him no?_


	4. Things we say over the kitchen table.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tumblr prompt.

“Pass the sweetener, love?” 

He reached out and picked it up automatically, without looking up from his datapad. They were meant to be plotting routes around the Imperial convoys near Belsavis and some of the calculations were difficult enough that Hera had enlisted his help, despite the fact that she was better at it. Many hands make light work and all of that.

He held the sweetener out for a few seconds before he realised that Hera hadn’t taken it from him. He looked up to see her staring at him, wide eyed. When she saw him looking she  _flushed_ that adorable shade of darker green that he only thought he’d seen once or twice in the year since he’d come on board. Confused, he shook the sweetener and held it towards her again. She took it, looking down and fumbling over her cup of kaf.

He blinked, shrugged and looked back down at his pad, before his brain helpfully replayed  _exactly what it was she’d called him._

Before he could open his mouth to ask, she had popped the lid back on her kaf and fled the table. 


End file.
